Archive for May, 2013
President Obama and the Guantanamo Heckler
Hecklers of speeches — especially major ones — aren’t new. A public disruption of a speaker is meant as an attempt to embarrass the speaker and get attention for the heckler and the heckler’s cause. Yesterday, Medea Benjamin of Code Pink attended the President’s speech at the National Defense University at Ft. McNair yesterday and proceeded to heckle him 3 times during the speech. The video below (approx 8 minutes long and I apologize for the commercial) shows that segment of the President’s speech. I couldn’t hear everything she said, but it seems clear to me that she was calling for the immediate release of some number of the Gitmo prisoners. While the President was proposing a new plan to close Gitmo. What is fascinating to me about this clip is the President’s reaction to Ms. Benjamin’s interruptions. Not only did he appear to be listening to her, but he validated her concerns (or some of them) as important and worth listening to. I can’t imagine GWB managing this kind of respect towards someone yelling at him, and whoever was yelling at him would have been immediately hustled away from the event — not given two more times to disrupt. I haven’t had a chance to see the entire speech to know what exactly the President said, so I’m not here agreeing or disagreeing with what he proposed yesterday. But I am pretty proud of the way he handled this:
![Friday Daily Delawhere [5.24.13]](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7359/8754391431_01f7dc545e_z.jpg "Friday Daily Delawhere [5.24.13]")
Thursday Open Thread [5.23.13]
This is both hysterical funny and hysterical crazy (not to mention headache inducing):
That’s why you saw the House of Representatives pass my [Michelle Bachmann’s] bill, the full repeal of Obamacare last week, and that’s why I have renewed confidence that we can see this bill pass in the Senate and I think the President will ultimately be forced to repudiate his own signature piece of legislation because the American people will demand it.
And I think before his second term is over, we’re going to see a miracle before our eyes, I believe God is going to answer our prayers and we’ll be freed from the yoke of Obamacare. I believe that’s going to happen and we saw step one last week with the repeal of Obamacare in the House. We have two more steps. We serve a mighty God and I believe it can happen.
Yah, Michelle, you keep telling yourself that. Methinks you will be disappointed in your God quite soon, as the repeal bill will never be heard in the Senate and even if it did, it will be defeated.
Upcoming Events: Happy Birthday, Mr. President….
This sounds like a cool panel to check out. The Delaware Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) and the National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare (NCPSSM) are co-hosting an event on the former President’s birthday as a tribute to President John F. Kennedy, who strengthened Social Security, fought for the establishment of Medicare, and advocated for closing the same corporate tax loopholes that corporations still abuse to this day. The speakers will be Wilmington Mayor Dennis P. Williams, retired Delaware Social Security executive Tom Tobin, NCPSSM Grassroots National Director Ernie Powell, and businessman Andrew Groff, and Jon “Bowzer” Bauman, former lead singer of the famous Sha Na Na, will sing Happy Birthday to the President, hopefully not in the Marilyn Monroe style.
![Thursday Daily Delawhere [5.23.13]](http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2885/8755519722_f1d9b8946c_z.jpg "Thursday Daily Delawhere [5.23.13]")
Late Night Video — Gov. Markell Appears on Huff Post Live
Not sure that big news is made here — discussing gun safety (universal background checks), kids aging out of foster care, gay marriage (approx. 13 minutes):
PDD-DL Vote Tracker Update for May 22, 2013
Not much new this week, since the Assembly is out of session for the next two weeks as the Joint Finance Committee finishes the budget. Still there was some action on the bills we are following, and there have been two new bills that I have added to the Trackers as they seem interesting. The first is Rep. Rebecca Walker’s House Bill 131, or the Gestational Carrier Agreement Bill. At first, I thought the term “Gestational Carrier” was an overly technical and political correct replacement for Surrogate Mother. But it turns out that I was wrong.
There are two kinds of Surrogacy. One is where the surrogate mother is genetically related to the child she is carrying, or in other words, the surrogate mother used her own egg and had it artificially inseminated by the intended father. This is called traditional surrogacy. If the surrogate mother carries an fertilized egg to term and she is not genetically related to it, that is gestational surrogacy, and Representaive Walker’s legislation establishes the legal rights of all involved in a gestational surrogacy.
Titles and labels aside, the bill is a good idea, as it establishes into law the notion that these agreements between a couple and a surrogate mother are binding legal contracts. According to the legislation, after the child is born, the intended parent becomes the legal parent of the child and the gestational carrier would have no parental rights. In New Jersey, Governor Christie vetoed a similar law, and his official reason is that it could radically change the traditional notion of the family. Please. This bill allows more families to be created, which I thought was a good thing.
The other bill (Senator Hocker’s Senate Bill 74) features an unholy alliance of Progressive and Arch Conserative sponsors, all agreeing on transparency and open government. See Democratic Leadership, the GOP is really going after you on transparency. It is a potent issue, and you ignore it at your peril.
Wednesday Open Thread [5.22.13]
Republican Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma has in the past opposed emergency aid for Hurricane Sandy. But unlike his Oklahoman colleague in the Senate, Tom Coburn, he will support federal emergency funds for the Moore Tornado disaster. Which means of course, he is a flaming hypocrite who would deny aid to East Coast Democrats and liberals but gladly take it for his Sooner state conservatives. Not so, says Inhofe. A tornado and a hurricane are “totally different.”
That was a “totally different” situation, Inhofe told MSNBC, arguing that the Sandy aid was filled with pork. There were “things in the Virgin Islands. They were fixing roads there and putting roofs on houses in Washington, D.C. Everybody was getting in and exploiting the tragedy that took place. That won’t happen in Oklahoma.”
Oh sweet Jesus. Is Inhofe unaware that the Hurricane hit the DC, Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and all of New England too? Is he not aware that the Virgin Islands are hit by tropical storms and Hurricanes on a yearly basis. Why are Republican Senators so fucking stupid? Why!!!???!!!
I like this new Pope.
“This ‘closing off’ that imagines that those outside, everyone, cannot do good is a wall that leads to war and also to what some people throughout history have conceived of: killing in the name of God. That we can kill in the name of God. And that, simply, is blasphemy. To say that you can kill in the name of God is blasphemy … The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! ‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! …
We all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, if we do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter: we need that so much. We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good: we will meet one another there,” – Pope Francis, in the weekly Wednesday homily (sermon) today at the Vatican.
![Wednesday Daily Delawhere [5.22.13]](http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3688/8754391439_4c50df6c0c_z.jpg "Wednesday Daily Delawhere [5.22.13]")
Finally got my hands on the Phillips complaint.
It’s pretty disgusting, the allegations contained therein. Read at your own peril. It is a public filing, so it is ok for you to read it. And while the Plaintiff/alleged victim is over 18 now, and while her name is plastered all over that complaint, I will not tolerate any mention of her name here in the comments. If the complaint is to be believed (and I do believe it), this young woman was a sexual assault victim, and I will not have her attacked by name or even mentioned by name on this thread. Consider it the Rape Shield Law extended.
A story to keep an eye on…
From the News Journal:
A 58-year-old New Castle man was critically injured this morning after opening an ammunition box left by a neighbor in the Van Dyke Village neighborhood for a special trash pick up, officials said. Explosive experts from Dover Air Force Base have been called to help after officials believe they found more explosives.
According to Chionchio, a woman on Van Dyke Drive put several items out for a special trash pickup today. This included an ammo box that belonged to her husband. She did not know there were explosives in the box, Chionchio said.
The man, a neighbor from across the street, asked if he could have the box. After getting her permission he took it across the street and placed it on a pickup truck tailgate. As he opened the box, Chionchio said, a mortar shell went off, covering him in shrapnel.
When I first read this story as it was breaking this morning, it sounded like a man was building a bomb and it exploded on him. Now it appears that the husband of the woman who put out the explosives in the trash unknowingly, and that the injured man was an innocent victim. Still, the question remains why the husband had the explosives in the first place, and how many more explosives does he have. Before our Second Amendment fetishists get their britches in knots, please note that there is no right to bear explosives. It is quite illegal. And it is quite Constitutional for them to be illegal.
Tuesday Open Thread [5.21.13]
Virginia state Sen. Mark Obenshain (R), the Republican nominee for Attorney General in Virginia, had introduced legislation in 2009 to require women to report their miscarriages to their local police department. Not only that, these devastated women would have to provide information in their report on the location of the fetus’ remains. Or else what, you ask? Well, if the mother did not report her miscarriage to the police, she would be charged and presumably be found guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor, which in Virginia carries a maximum sentence of “confinement in jail for not more than twelve months and a fine of not more than $2,500.” And they wonder why women, nationwide and in Virginia, have a problem voting Republican. Hey Assshain, oh excuse me, Obenshain, a woman’s miscarriage is none of your goddamn business, nor the government’s. It is a horrible tragedy for expectant mothers to go through. And you want to make their pain worse.
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